


fifty thousand dollars

by lalaland666 (orphan_account)



Series: whumptober 2020 [2]
Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Aziraphale and Crowley are Warlock Dowling's Parents, Child Neglect, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Kidnapping, The Dowlings' A+ Parenting (Good Omens), Threats of Violence, Warlock Dowling Needs a Hug, Whumptober 2020
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-02
Updated: 2020-10-02
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:01:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,670
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26782600
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/lalaland666
Summary: Warlock Dowling wasnothaving a good day.
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley & Warlock Dowling
Series: whumptober 2020 [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1950676
Comments: 4
Kudos: 95
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	fifty thousand dollars

**Author's Note:**

> For the prompt Kidnapped. It's "loving and appreciating Warlock Dowling" hours 24/7 in this household. note: there is a very brief and relatively oblique reference to child trafficking in this one; please be careful if that'll be an issue for you.

Warlock Dowling was _not_ having a good day. 

“They won’t _do_ anything!” he protested loudly. “They’re all caught up in politics and optics and all that bullshit, they won’t just send you the money.” 

“Somebody shut him up,” one of Warlock’s captors– _kidnappers_ – snarled. A piece of dark-colored, foul-tasting fabric was shoved into Warlock’s mouth. He did his best to bite down on the fingers putting it there, but they jerked out of the way before he could manage it, and then slapped him across the face for the effort. 

_Would’ve been worth it,_ Warlock thought. 

He looked around. He was sat in the back of a van somewhere, alongside eight men in dark clothes and ski masks, all with very large and very scary-looking guns held close to their chests. He was pretty sure there were two more up front, and another standing just outside, making the call to Warlock’s dad, asking for fifty thousand dollars in ransom money. 

(Warlock had almost laughed at the number, when he’d first heard it. Thaddeus Dowling the Third was a US senator now, and fifty thousand was less than a third of his official annual salary. Warlock knew, depending on the year, he could easily pull in twenty times that, and that wasn’t even mentioning the investments and iffy offshore accounts that Warlock was pretty sure he wasn’t supposed to know about– not yet, at least. Fifty thousand was nothing.) 

(Not that that fact guaranteed that his dad would pay.) 

The van wasn’t moving, as far as Warlock could tell, but it did bounce noticeably every time one of the kidnappers moved. Warlock’s hands were tied behind his back, and his head still hurt a little bit from whatever chemical they’d used to knock him out and drag him here– if his action movies were anything to go by, it was chloroform, but he honestly wasn’t sure. 

Suddenly, the door at the back of the van swung open, and Warlock squinted out into the darkness to see the ninth kidnapper standing there, the phone in his hand still lit up. 

Warlock’s stomach sank. 

“He just kept yelling about how he was gonna call the cops,” the kidnapper growled, clambering into the van and slamming the door shut behind him. “Hadn’t even noticed the kid was missing yet.” 

Warlock let out a garbled sound that might have, without the gag, been “I _told_ you.” One of the kidnappers clipped him on the temple almost carelessly, knocking him onto his side, and he yelped, more in indignation than anything else. They still needed him. If they wanted his dad’s money, they still needed– 

“Don’t think it’s worth the trouble, boys. Let’s see if we can’t still get some money out of this one, and next time we’ll pick up a kid whose parents actually love them.” 

That hit like another blow to the head. Warlock squeezed his eyes shut, biting down on the gag to keep from making any more noise, as the kidnappers all began moving. The doors open again, letting the light from inside the van spill out onto the old dirt road where they were parked, and it felt like two of the kidnappers climbed out, making the whole thing sway again. Someone rapped on the opposite wall, probably to tell the driver to start the engine, and then the seven kidnappers left in the back with Warlock all sat down and waited. 

And waited. 

And waited. 

Warlock opened his eyes slowly to see them all looking around at each other. The doors were still open, and the van was definitively not starting. 

“What the hell is–?” one of them began. 

And then someone _screamed_. 

Immediately, five of the kidnappers leapt out of the van, their guns pointing around wildly, while the other two grabbed onto Warlock and dragged him away from the open door, standing over him menacingly. 

There was a moment of silence. The only movement was the quiet rustling of the corn fields, and the faint hooting of a far-off owl. Warlock shivered, curling his legs up protectively in front of him. _Not that it makes any difference, really._

The kidnappers looked around at each other, their guns slowly lowering. 

Then there was a flash of black and red, gleaming in the light from the van, sending three of the five men outside sprawling and causing the rest to descend into chaos. There was shouting, and gunfire, and one of the guys still inside the van leapt out, and Warlock scrambled back, his own muffled scream rising up in his throat, his eyes fixed on the open doors– 

There was someone there. Someone new. Someone in beige and blue and white, glowing like a messenger from Heaven, appearing inside the van without having climbed inside. Warlock’s last guard shouted, bringing his gun around to bear, but the newcomer just grabbed onto his arm and _threw_ him, just tossed him aside like he weighed nothing at all. He went sprawling out into the dirt and chaos outside, and Warlock’s gaze landed on the other one, his breath coming in short, panicked gasps. 

Immediately, the thing– the man– dropped to his knees in front of Warlock, his weird glow fading away into nothing, his eyes– blue, so, so blue, and so _familiar_ – scanning Warlock up and down as he reached out slowly, palms up, a soft smile on his face. 

“Warlock,” he said softly, and that _voice_ , Warlock knew he knew it. “Are you hurt?” 

Warlock made a noise through the gag, and the man reached out, pulling it out carefully, his other hand landing on Warlock’s cheek before skating down to his shoulder, warm and comfortable and steady and– 

_A garden, back in England, Warlock catching bugs outside and showing them off, and brilliant blue eyes crinkling down at him in a smile every time._

“Brother Francis?” he gasped, as the bindings on his wrists fell away– how, he wasn’t sure, but that didn’t matter, because Brother Francis was _here_ , and he looked completely different and his accent was all southern and posh but it was _him_ , it was, it had to be. 

“You remember me,” Brother Francis said, picking Warlock up and pulling him into his lap, like he had so many times when Warlock was younger and he’d fallen down in the garden, and Warlock couldn’t help but curl into him, staring up at his face, so odd-looking without the sideburns and buck teeth, tears welling up in his eyes despite his best efforts. 

“You’re here,” Warlock said, almost numbly, as Brother Francis held him close, as the aches and pains in his head and jaw and wrists and the churning nausea in his gut all faded away as though they’d never been there in the first place, just like they always did when Brother Francis was around. 

“I am,” Brother Francis said, his voice quiet. “My dear boy…” 

And that, that too-familiar phrase in that too-different voice after this endlessly long night, these endlessly long years, it was too much, and Warlock snapped. 

“You _left_!” he shouted, twisting in Brother Francis’s arms, beating his fists against the gardner’s chest. “You just– you just _left_ , you didn’t even say goodbye, no phone calls, no letters, no emails, _nothing_ , it’s been _three years_ and you weren’t there and I missed you so much and I hate it here and they were gonna sell me or kill me or something and I was so scared and it was only fifty thousand dollars and he wasn’t gonna pay and they _didn’t even notice_ …” 

At some point, Warlock had stopped hitting Brother Francis’s jacket and had started clinging to it instead, his face buried in Brother Francis’s shoulder as he _sobbed_. Brother Francis held him tighter, murmuring soothing nonsense, running a gentle hand up and down his back as Warlock cried out three years’ worth of loneliness and hurt in his arms. 

The noises from outside had stopped at some point, and the van bounced suddenly with the weight of another person. Warlock’s head jerked up, panic catching in his throat, as his eyes landed on– 

She– he? they?– looked completely different, now, too. But Warlock recognized the hair, the sharp face, the ever-present sunglasses. 

The soft, sheepish smile that spread across her face. “Hey, hellspawn.” 

“Nanny!” Warlock cried, leaping to his feet and launching himself into Nanny Ashtoreth’s arms. Nanny caught him, tugged him close, held him sure and steady as she pressed a kiss to the top of his head. 

“We’ve got you,” she promised. “Did they hurt you?” 

Warlock pressed his face into Nanny’s– her chest, now. Last time he’d done this, he’d still been level with her belly. “A little bit. It doesn’t hurt now, though. I think… I think they were gonna sell me. My dad–” He choked on the words, clinging all the more tightly to Nanny, desperate to keep her close, to keep both of them close. Brother Francis’s hand landed on Warlock’s back, and he nearly sobbed again, muffling the sound in Nanny’s shirt. 

“Your dad _what_?” Nanny asked, her voice low and dangerous. 

“Crowley,” Brother Francis admonished softly. “Not now, darling.” 

Warlock picked his head up, staring pleadingly between the two of them. “Don’t leave again. Please, _please_ , don’t go again. You can’t leave. You _can’t_.” There were tears in his eyes again, but he couldn’t help it, couldn’t stop them, couldn’t hide the way his voice broke on the question. “Why did you leave me?” 

Both Nanny and Brother Francis clung to Warlock just a little bit tighter, and Nanny kissed his head again, fierce and protective. 

“We didn’t want to,” Brother Francis promised. “Oh, my dear child. Neither of us wanted to go.” 

“Let’s get you somewhere safe, hellspawn,” Nanny said, low and warm and gentle, and even with the weird new accent, Warlock still felt himself relaxing at the familiar voice. “And then…” 

Brother Francis sighed. “And then, my dear, I do believe we owe you quite an explanation.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!


End file.
